One would have thought that a serious exhibition organized by -- among others -- the British Museum would have separated out the facts and the speculations. But no -- speculations are presented as if they are facts over and again. For example:
Mike Pitts on the BM blog site, going on about quarries, overland transport by tribal groups, and a "lost circle" built and then dismantled. The orthodox narrative rules, and higher authority dictates that nobody should deviate from it by a single inch. It's more than a little pathetic, as well as being completely dishonest :
Stonehenge is very unusual in the ancient world for the distances over which its materials were transported to the site, especially those megaliths we know as bluestones. Most of these, made from different types of igneous rock, were quarried in south west Wales – I estimate their journey at 220 miles.
.....we think the original bluestone structure was a large circle of 56 stones, raised five centuries before anything else. People could, if they’d wanted to (who knows?), have brought one stone to Wiltshire every year for 56 years – raising one could have been done entirely independently of any others.
Then a friend of mine posted this page, which I assume has come from the exhibition handbook or catalogue:
"Chemical analysis suggests that several lived and died in West Wales before their remains were interred within the monument...."
"Recent excavations at Craig Rhos-y-felin in SW Wales, one of the sources of the bluestones have advanced understanding of Stonehenge and the people who made it........"
That is all complete poppycock. I think I know the evidence pretty well, and those statements are false, based upon fantasies and wishful thinking.
It would be nice if the BM were to show a somewhat greater regard for science and hard evidence instead of simply wallowing in the mythology happily invented by Parker Pearson, Pitts and others.
14 comments:
Duly posted onto my Facebook.......so I've lit the blue touch -paper and await the aggrieved responses.....
There are some very sensitive people out there, who will perceive this as an attack on democracy, civilisation and a good deal else as well........ As Master Kurdling said to young Molesworth: "Boy!! How dare you seek to disturb the ignorance of a lifetime?!!"
Further examples in this exhibition of the repetitive " broken record" phenomenon of the Stonehenge - Preseli 'mythos' that, Q.E.D., OF COURSE Stonehenge exerted a magnetic and all - embracing pull upon all the less significant outliers of the Salisbury Plain pre - eminent monument. Barclay & Brophy are just two archaeologists who disagree!
Moving 1 Bluestone a year, taking 56 years to deliver all of them to Stonehenge is insane!
I suggested 10 years ago on here and on the Megalithic Portal site of a system of moving the Bluestones together in larger groups of stones, maybe 10 stones per trip (the Conveyor System).
This system would not only make the physical job of moving easier but would speed up the delivery of the stones. If the people of the time made only 1 trip per year then it would take only 5/6 years yo get all of the stones to Stonehenge! More teams working at different sites and you see that this could be done in a relatively short period of time, a few years maybe.
Is there evidence that this kind of system was used? Yes, It can be found in what people have been referring to them as the Dressed side of the stones, both The Bluestones and the Sarsens have this evidence. I believe it comes from the friction caused by the stones rolling over logs between each other.
Can this be verified / proven? Yes, take a number of Bluestones and repeat this method!
If my theory is correct then the Bluestones will show friction damage that will resemble the Bluestones at Stonehenge. End of discussion about how they were moved!
Paul
Not able to add a few images of the Conveyor System at this time
There is endless speculation about transport techniques and timing -- all completely superfluous in my view, since no matter how many experiments are done and how many "methods" are enumerated, there is not a shred of evidence to show that the bluestones at Stonehenge are not just an assemblage of glacial erratics, some of which have been dressed or shaped for specific uses in one setting or another....
"Some of which have been dressed or shaped for specific uses in one setting or another...."
Here we go again referring to the Stones as Dressed or Shaped again. This one of the most confusing parts of the Stonehenge mystery to me, believing that someone actually took the time to sit down and tap repeatedly with another stone to give Stonehenge a finished look!
Why would they do this ,for kicks? Has anyone tried to repeat this process to determine if this is actual possible and how long it would take to complete a stone? Haven't seen any reports online to indicate this was even possible. Seems superfluous to me to be honest.
Are we to believe that the Neolithic people got lucky to find all of the glacial erratics in the general area and did not miss a Bluestone or leave one behind? Where are the rest of the glacial erratics ?
Your Glacial theory is somewhat dependent on the Dressed Stone scenario isn't it Brian?
Without the stones being explained as being Dressed your theory becomes less believable.
With my theory the stones are not Dressed but are damaged due to my method being used to transport them to the site.
What needs to happen now is for someone (not me, I don't have the resources to complete the task) to repeat my theory in the field. Take 5 or 6 Bluestones and keep rolling them over each other and collect the data. It is a simple experiment and would likely show that the damage seen will be similar to how the stones presently look (not accounting for 5000 years of weather wear).
Maybe there is a Educational Institution willing to participate, who knows?
Paul
Most likely other glacial erratics occur within the Ministry of Defence's Salisbury Plain Training Area. Have you considered that likelihood, Paul? Salisbury Plain is an immense area, comparable in size to the Isle of Wight!! Hardly any of us venture into the SPTA even when parts ARE open to the public, because caution is paramount because of the danger from unexploded ordnances.
yes -- there could well be bluestones all over the place, embedded in the soil or in clearance cairns etc, and unrecognized. There are certainly plenty of fragments. I did a random test once with visitors to Stonehenge, asking them to look at a sarsen stone and a bluestone and say which was which. All of them said that the sarsen stone was more blue than the bluestone! In the wild they are VERY difficult to tell apart.........
The "missing" bluestones are a problem whichever transport theory you subscribe to. I think the builders of Stonehenge used up all the stones they could find within striking distance, and then ran out of supplies -- so that Stonehenge was never finished. If Stonehenge WAS finished, and if 40 or more bluestones were then stolen or taken away or broken up for souvenirs, where are they?
Tony Hinchliffe said...
Most likely other glacial erratics occur within the Ministry of Defence's Salisbury Plain Training Area. Have you considered that likelihood, Paul?
Tony -I have done a quick search of this blog and couldn't find a map showing the extent of Glacial movement into the Salisbury Plain area. Did glaciers actually make it this far?
I sure Brian will have the answer.
Paul
I have resisted the temptation to speculate, since currently we don't have enough evidence. I have suggested many times that Stonehenge was built because that is where the stones were --- and if it was all down to geomorphology I would argue that there are enough bluestone fragments in the debitage and the superficial deposits at Stonehenge to suggest very ancient and largely destroyed glacial deposits, with an assortment of 43 bluestones from many locations, the bulk of which look just like highly abraded and weathered glacial erratics. That, together with the fact that Neolithic and Bronze Age builders of megalithic monuments ALWAYS used the stones that were readily to hand, suggests to me that the ice edge probably did lie somewhere near Stonehenge. Glacial modelling work (on the extent of UK glaciations) suggests that this was all perfectly possible.
And if anybody suggests that our prehistoric ancestors did not ALWAYS use locally available monoliths and boulders, since Stonehenge is the grand exception, I will say "Prove that for me, if you please......"
I'm more than a little surprised by the gullibility of the people who put this exhibition together. No doubt they were told by MPP and assorted other "experts" that such-and-such was the case, and responded by saying "They must know what they are talking about. Who are we to disbelieve them?" I'm afraid there is rather a lot of gullibility around at the moment -- it's a sort of epidemic........
Thank goodness that Senior Civil Servant Sue Gray is, by and large, not so gullible as those who put the British Museum exhibition together. Boris seems just as determined to resume "getting on" with what he sees as his pre - ordained mission, rather like the hallowed hierarchy of Stonehenge archaeological "experts". So the 'received wisdom ' they impart to the 'ignorant' masses continues to completely mislead when it comes to the mode of arrival of the bluestones, in all their great geological variety.
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